Re: Facts That Make Walz Run.

From: Sam Wormley (swormley1_at_mchsi.com)
Date: 06/23/04 

Date: Wed, 23 Jun 2004 01:56:59 GMT

Ref: http://www.csicop.org/si/2003-03/commentary.html
Skeptical Inquirer magazine: Mar 2003
Lessons of the 'Fake Moon Flight' Myth
by James Oberg

Depending on the opinion polls, there's a core of Apollo moon
flight disbelievers within the United States--perhaps 10 percent of
the population, and up to twice as large in specific demographic
groups. Overseas the results are similar, fanned by local attitudes
toward the U.S. in general and technology in particular. Some
religious fundamentalists--Hare Krishna cultists and some
extreme Islamic mullahs, for example--declare the theological
impossibility of human trips to other worlds in space.

Resentment of American cultural and political dominance clearly
fuels other "disbelievers," including those political groups who had
been hoping for a different outcome to the Space Race--for
example, many Cuban schools, both in Cuba and where Cuban
schoolteachers were loaned, such as Sandinista Nicaragua, taught
their students that Apollo was a fraud.

Like a counter-culture heresy, the "moon hoax" theme had been
lingering beyond the fringes of mainstream society for decades. A
self-published pamphlet here, or a "B-grade" science fiction movie
there, or a radio talk show guest over there--for many years it all
looked like a shriveling leftover of the original human inability to
accept the reality of revolutionary changes.

But in the last ten years, an entirely new wave of hoax theories
have appeared--on cable TV, on the Internet, via self-publishing,
and through other "alternative" publication methods. These
methods are the result of technological progress that Apollo
symbolized, now ironically fueling the arguments against one of
the greatest technological achievements in human history.

NASA's official reaction to these and other questions was both
clumsy and often counter-productive. On the infamous Fox
Television moon hoax program, which was broadcast several
times in the first half of 2001, a NASA spokesman named Brian
Welch appeared several times to counter the hoaxist arguments
(Welch was a top-level official at the Public Affairs Office at NASA
Headquarters, who died a few months later). The poor TV
impression he gave (a know-it-all "rocket scientist" denouncing
each argument as false but usually without providing supporting
evidence) may have been due to deliberate editing by the
producers to make the "NASA guy" look arrogant and
contemptuous. But to a large degree it accurately reflected
NASA's institutional attitude to the entire controversy. The
disappointing results of participating seemed to strengthen the
view within NASA that the best response was no response--to
avoid anything that might dignify the charges.

Roger Launius, then the chief of the history office at headquarters,
was an exception to NASA's overall unwillingness to engage the
issue. As an amateur space historian and folklorist, I had been
discussing with him for years the need for NASA to fulfill its
educational outreach charter and to issue a series of modest
monographs (a historian's term for a single-theme
pamphlet-length publication) on many different widespread
cultural myths about space activities. These ranged from
allegations of UFO sightings (and videotapings) by astronauts, to
the discovery of alien artifacts on the Moon and Mars and
elsewhere, to miraculous and paranormal folklore associated with
space activities, to the hoax accusations. Launius, nearing
retirement in early 2002, decided it was time for a detailed
response to the Apollo hoax accusations, and offered me a
sole-source contract to write a monograph that analyzed why
such stories seemed so attractive to so many people. Launius
departed NASA soon thereafter, leaving the project in the care of a
junior historian, Stephen Garber.

My requests for inputs from various NASA offices and public
educational organizations soon reached the ears of news
reporters, and some print stories appeared in late October.
Although NASA officials were somewhat taken aback by the
publicity, they were at first inclined to defend the project on
educational grounds.

Then, on Monday, November 4, 2002, the eve of the national
elections, ABC's World News Tonight anchor Peter Jennings
chose the subject for his closing story: "Finally this evening, we're
not quite sure what we think about this," he intoned. "But the space
agency is going to spend a few thousand dollars trying to prove to
some people that the United States did indeed land men on the
moon."

Jennings described how "NASA had been so rattled" it "hired"
somebody "to write a book refuting the conspiracy theorists." He
closed with a misquotation: "A professor of astronomy in
California said he thought it was beneath NASA's dignity to give
these Twinkies the time of day. Now, that was his phrase, by the
way. We simply wonder about NASA."

Jennings was referring to Philip Plait, an educator (not a
professor) in California who runs the Bad Astronomy Web site
that discusses many mythical aspects of outer space. What Plait
actually had said was that he felt it was proper for NASA to
respond, but that it did seem "beneath their dignity" to be forced to
do it. Contrary to Jennings's account, Plait fully supported the
monograph contract.

But that TV insult did it as far as NASA management was
concerned. Their dignity called into question, and fearing angry
telephone calls from congressmen returning to Washington after
the election, they decided to revoke the contract. They paid for
work done to date and washed their hands of the project.

Many educators contacted me in dismay. Like them, and unlike
the NASA spokesmen, I had always felt that "there is no such thing
as a stupid question." And to me the moon hoax controversy was
not a bothersome distraction, but a unique opportunity.

This is the way I see it: If many people who are exposed to the
hoaxist arguments find them credible, it is neither the fault of the
hoaxists or of their believers--it's the fault of the educators and
explainers (NASA among them) who were responsible for
providing adequate knowledge and workable reasoning skills.
And the localized success of the hoaxist arguments thus provides
us with a detection system to identify just where these resources
are inadequate.

I intend to complete the project, depending on successfully
arranging new funding sources. The popularity of this particular
myth is a heaven-sent (or actually, an "outer-space-sent")
opportunity to address fundamental issues of public
understanding of technological controversies.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Facts That Make Walz Run.
    ... Lessons of the 'Fake Moon Flight' Myth ... there's a core of Apollo moon ... (Welch was a top-level official at the Public Affairs Office at NASA ... Many educators contacted me in dismay. ...
    (sci.math)
  • Re: moon landings were a hoax
    ... Lessons of the 'Fake Moon Flight' Myth ... there's a core of Apollo moon ... (Welch was a top-level official at the Public Affairs Office at NASA ... Many educators contacted me in dismay. ...
    (sci.astro.amateur)
  • Could moon landings have been faked? Some still think so
    ... A cult of conspiracy theorists believe NASA faked the Apollo moon ... Theorists point to "inconsistencies" in NASA photos and TV footage ... A poll shows 6 percent of Americans believe the Apollo moon landings ...
    (rec.sport.pro-wrestling)
  • Re: Men on the moon?
    ... Lessons of the 'Fake Moon Flight' Myth ... and through other "alternative" publication methods. ... (Welch was a top-level official at the Public Affairs Office at NASA ... Many educators contacted me in dismay. ...
    (sci.physics)
  • NASA Gives Media, Public Look Inside Apollo Moon Rock Vault
    ... NASA GIVES MEDIA, PUBLIC LOOK INSIDE APOLLO MOON ROCK VAULT ... interview opportunities from the Apollo Lunar Sample Processing Lab ...
    (sci.space.news)